Happy Birthday K-Man!!

Today was K-Man's 3rd birthday. Three years ago on the 26th, we got an email about Keegan. An email. A freakin' email, people. When does someone learn about such a life-changing thing in an email. Anyway, today was three years on this planet for Keegan. This planet will never be the same.

Jen started a nice tradition last year of a birthday breakfast. We did that again this morning. Kee is very fond of biscuits, so Jen cooked some Pillsbury Grands in the oven for his special day. He loved it. We didn't have any candles, so we used some long matches instead. Three of them planted in a Grand. Pure celebration!

The last three years with Keegan have been beyond life-changing. I thought that I could love him like I do, but it feels different than I thought it would. When he engages me, I see and hear nothing else. Nothing penetrates my hard outer shell like that boy's voice.

Here's a snippet of a recent bed-time "conversation" with mom. We've gotten into a decent routine of reading books and praying and "kisses all together" (which is Jen and I kissing him on each cheek at the same time. The kid comes unglued with glee. Love unfettered.)

(Jen was reading a new book of Five Minute Devotionals that Kerri Barfield recommended. The story involved a penguin and patience.)

Jen: See the penguin there?

K-Man: It's Koko.

It looks like Koko, but it's not Koko.

I want to watch Koko.

No, we can't watch Koko now. Maybe later. See, the penguin is sitting on the egg.

He's poopin'.

No, he's sitting on the egg, like when we have breakfast.

I want egg. I'm hungry.

No, you're not hungry. You can eat tomorrow.

The moral of this story is that stories with morals don't really register with three-year-olds.

But dang, that boy is hilarious.

In case you don't happen to know the story about how we were blessed with Keegan, you can read the two-part story here:

Part one

Part two

R.I.P. Paul Benedict

Before he was Bentley on The Jeffersons, Paul Benedict was the Mad Painter on Sesame Street.

This is one of my favorite Mad Painter shorts that I remember growing up as a kid.



R.I.P. Paul Benedict

Pick me! Pick me! Pick me!

There is a scene towards the end of K-Man's currently favorite movie Polar Express where Santa is about to select one kid to receive the first gift of that Christmas. One of the kids (voiced by the same guy who played "Eugene Felnic" in Grease) obnoxiously tries to get Santa to bestow the honor on him with a Horshack-like chorus of "pick me! pick me! pick me!" Of course Santa doesn't pick him. He picks the boy who is quietly taking it all in as he comes to terms with Santa's existence. I much prefer to be that latter boy.

But I am in the midst of doing some networking that requires me to talk about how "great" I am, and I am suffering from some cognitive dissonance about the whole thing. The dissonance comes not from whether I really think I am that good. I do. It comes from a belief that going around telling everyone about how good you are (like a Big 12 South team trying to convince pollsters) is unappealing at best. It feels so fake. Rather than be the annoying guy asking to be picked, I'd prefer to let my work speak for itself and "get picked."

But I'm told it's not as passive a process as that. I need to actively sell what I can do and how I can benefit another organization. That's just sort of how it works. So I guess I have no choice. But to be believable, I need to find some level of congruence on what I believe about myself and the manner in which I convey that to others in this networking process.